


In the Dark Hour

by Avia_Isadora



Series: Four Nights to Rome [1]
Category: The Borgias (Showtime TV)
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-12 21:41:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29516163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Avia_Isadora/pseuds/Avia_Isadora
Summary: Giulia Farnese has gone to Pesaro to see Lucretia on Rodrigo's orders, but the situation is much worse than she feared.Goes in episode 1.7 "Death on a Pale Horse".
Relationships: Lucrezia Borgia/Paolo, Rodrigo Borgia | Pope Alexander VI/Giulia Farnese
Series: Four Nights to Rome [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2181156
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5





	In the Dark Hour

Giulia does not sleep under the roof of the Lord of Pesaro. She retires to her guest chamber as she should – nicely but not lavishly appointed, the bed hangings dated and somewhat worn, the second-best guest room. The best is for Giovanni Sforza’s cousin Caterina. When she has closed the door, she carefully examines everything. Two candles in their holders, but no floor stand that could be used to wedge the door. A window that opens onto the inner courtyard, looking down two stories to the stableyard, not even to the roof of a shed. The water in the basin is tepid. The bed is made up nicely, but Giulia does not lie down. She does not undress. She does not even loosen her hair from its elaborate pins. She sits in the chair by the window and is silent. Anyone listening will hear nothing.

Caterina told her baldly that the Sforzas would not honor their agreements with the Pope. Lucretia told her she was pregnant by a man not her husband. She knows too much to be allowed to leave, and the moment Lucretia’s secret is known…. There are ways to make a woman miscarry. A beating is simplest, and no authority on earth would disallow a husband’s right. Well, except one, and that is the Pope they plot against.

Giulia is not frightened. A cold, silent calm has descended upon her. It always does. She suspects Lucretia would understand why, now. She is married to Giovanni Sforza, after all. She is not a little girl who cannot understand why one would count the beats of one’s heart. She is not a girl who does not understand the difference between chaste kisses and passionate ones.

She bends her head ruefully. Once, she kissed her. Once she kissed her lover’s daughter, her friend, and drew back. She is cautious. She does not let passion rule her, not except in one thing and even then she resists. Her heart resists loving a man who loves her, even as her body yields willingly. One’s heart is all one really owns, in the end.

But now, tonight, in the citadel of her enemy with not one but two deadly secrets held in her bosom, she wishes Rodrigo were here. No, not here for then he would be a prisoner too, but that she could speak with him. He would think of something clever. He would twist and turn and somehow find a way out. He would, at least, have a reassuring word. But if he is not now besieged he soon will be, and these very enemies are the allies he expects to march to his aid.

There is only Giulia. There is only herself to bring Lucretia to safety, only herself to rescue herself. If she fails, Rodrigo will never know what happened to her. She has no illusions that he will have any power to protect her, and avenging her will do her little good. 

The house is silent at last. If there are any to watch, they watch the outer walls. Giovanni Sforza does not hold women in high estimate, and Catarina who knows better is not the mistress here. No one is guarding her chamber door. Giulia slips out. She makes her way to the stables by the fleeting light of the setting moon. In two hours it will be gone. 

And there is the groom, Paolo, lustful boy who has nearly condemned his mistress with his incontinence. She awakens him rudely. She tells him bluntly, as she must, that Lucretia’s life depends on his silence, and hopes he has sense enough to heed her. Two horses, hers and Lucretia’s, saddled and ready in two hours, well before dawn when the moon has set. She tells him, coldly, that she will kill him if he does not obey. Perhaps it is unnecessary. Perhaps he would do it for simple love of Lucretia, but she does not know him and Lucretia’s assurances are those of a love-struck girl. Cupid may afford to be capricious, but Venus is cruel. 

Giulia returns to her chamber to wait. She stands before the dying fire, spreading her hands to the warmth. She should pray. But to whom? What saint would intervene to help an unfaithful wife flee her husband, to help the Pope’s mistress return to him? She has never felt that ecstatic connection that Rodrigo craves. Perhaps her soul is too cold. Perhaps her faith is too shallow. And yet, when she looks at him there are moments she almost believes. Bride of Christ, the Roman wits call her. They laugh. And yet, sometimes, there is something in him which is not him. There is something tremblingly large, awesomely fragile, not unbearably bright but deep as a cool well. He knows her. 

She must get back to Rome. She must warn him of the Sforzas, get Lucretia to safety, and somehow evade every enemy in the process. Well, one plays one move at a time. Leaving Pesaro is first. 

Not quite two hours have passed when she slips out of her room again and into Lucretia’s. She wakes her gently with a hand to the shoulder. “Darling, it’s time,” she whispers.


End file.
